Sure you can find a good clam pie at any of New Haven’s famous pizzerias, but Modern’s more opulent clam pizza is inspired by the famous appetizer clams casino. It features minced bivalves on a charred, coal-oven crust, with red peppers and bacon: a winning combination of smoke and brine if ever there were one. The place was founded in 1934, so maybe it’s not so modern after all.

As you reach the final narrow neck of land in Napeague, Long Island that leads to Montauk, two generic places loom on the horizon, the first hawking lobster rolls, the next hoisting a sign that simply reads, Clam Bar. The fried clams are great, but even better are the steamed siphon clams served with drawn butter, a participatory meal that can leave an entire carload of sojourners delighted.

Yes, the moniker of this classic restaurant suggests it devotes all its attention to oysters. But there are just as many clam delights on the menu, from raw clams to a pair of chowders available at the snaking lunch counter and in the formal dining room. This being a Yankee seafood place, you may be tempted to order the mild New England clam chowder, but the zesty and peppery Manhattan clam chowder, which may be Sicilian in origin, is better. Note the restaurant is currently closed Saturdays and Sundays.

When it opened earlier this year behind Chelsea Market, nuevo pizzeria Mel’s caused a sensation with its giant clam appetizer. A behemoth shell holds a stuffing that includes minced clams and shrimp, breadcrumbs, and oregano, and garlic, making a gutbomb of what appears to be a single bivalve.

This fundamentally great Spanish restaurant, an updated facsimile of an actual restaurant in Spain, always has shellfish on its shifting menu. Keep an eye out for razor clams a la plancha, which are only seasonally available, but in their absence don’t miss the fideos — angel hair noodles browned to a crisp, mainly concealing a bed of a dozen or so in-shell Manila clams and chorizo.

For the true clam lover, few places are as good as the West Village restaurant known only as the Clam. The menu usually flaunts several clam recipes, often including raw littlenecks on the half shell, clam chowder, spaghetti with red clam sauce, clam pizza, clams in chowder sauce, and clams stuffed with pancetta. Likewise, there’s a near-legendary clam dip, served with homemade potato chips.

This surprising entry into the hubbub of Little Italy actually whips up great pizzas, and serves as a gathering place for hipoisie that happen to be in the neighborhood. More important for our purposes are the larger than usual stuffies (baked topneck clams) with an herby breadcrumb filling — exactly what you’d hoped for. Topnecks are a bit larger than littlenecks, making them a better deal but chewier than their smaller brethren.

In southern Italy, and now in Italian American cuisine, few dishes are as prized as clams oreganata — delicate littlenecks heaped with breadcrumbs flavored with oregano and garlic. The clams are sometimes minced for easier eating before returning to the shell, so make sure there’s plenty of bread at the ready to sop up the juices, which are the best part of this dish.

You can get local clams in black bean sauce at nearly any old-guard Cantonese in town, but one of the best and most voluminous versions is found at Lower East Side favorite Wu’s Wonton King. The fermented black beans exert their influence, of course, but as a showcase for the bitter and briny taste of cherrystones, this recipe is unparalleled.

Long Island is littered with fabled restaurants specializing in clams. Some of these places are seasonal, but others are year-round. Founded in 1939, Bigelow’s is one of the latter, serving lots of clam specialties in the New England style, including full-belly fried clams. The Ipswich clams are cooked to a golden brown perfection, offered with coleslaw and lemon wedges.

While nearby Bigelow’s serves New England-style fried clams, Peter’s Clam Bar — founded in 1940 — is the local favorite. From its decks and expansive dining rooms, one can sometimes see clammers in their hip waders tonging their way through the offshore grasses, though most of the shellfish now come from further east on Long Island. Yes, there are chowders, steamers, stuffies, linguine and clam sauce, and clambakes, but perhaps best of all are the raw clams on the half shell, spectacularly fresh.

Right by the Dongan Hills station on the Staten Island Railway, Lee’s Tavern, founded in 1940, is a cozy, wood-lined refuge. It’s also the principal proponent of the borough’s bar pie style, with pizzas that come in two sizes, featuring a crust firm enough that you can hold a slice with one hand while drinking a beer with the other. Available in red or white, the clam pie is perhaps the best at using that shellfish in the borough, though Denino’s gives it a run for its money.

This boardwalk institution has regaled Coney Island with corn dogs, soft serve ice cream, as well as raw and fried clams for 60 years. The raw clam service, a Coney Island tradition, is especially good, featuring a half-dozen, freshly-opened hard-shell clams on the half shell served with a lemon wedge — not exactly what you’d expect from a place specializing in fried foods. Paul’s is open six months of the year, up until mid-autumn; if closed, traipse on over to Nathan’s Famous, which also offers raw clams.